№ 06 Basic guide to essay writing. The outline of essay structure

№ 06 Basic guide to essay writing. The outline of essay structure

 

 

1.    

Step 1

Brainstorm. Write ideas and thoughts on a piece of paper or your computer’s notepad. While brainstorming, think about a chronological order for your ideas. Think about your introduction, the body of your work as well as the conclusion. Your topic will need to be thought about in detail before you begin writing the paper.

2.     Step 2

Write your thesis statement. This explains to the reader what you are trying to convey in your essay. When writing the thesis statement, remember to tell the reader what the topic is and key points of your essay. For example, if you are writing an essay about the assassination of JFK, explain that in the first part of the thesis statement. Then write one or two sentences about the point you are trying to make about his death. This can be short and it is a summery of your writing.

3.     Step 3

Write your introduction. This is the first paragraph that your readers will view. Primarily, this part catches the reader’s attention. It should be entertaining as well as informative. The introduction will explain what you are trying to tell or teach the reader about your topic.

4.     Step 4

Construct the body of your essay. This is the meat of your paper. It will inform your reader on key points and facts that they may not be aware of. Opinions should not be present in the body of the essay. You will want a clean and concise piece of work full of interesting tidbits and only facts about your topic. Use bullets to outline important points about your topic.

5.     Step Write the conclusion. This will sum up the information that you have provided in the essay. You may wish to cover important information and explain your thoughts on the subject. Keep opinions to a minimum, as the conclusion should also be fact-based.

 

 

 

Essay Structure

      Writing an academic essay means fashioning a coherent set of ideas into an argument. Because essays are essentially linear—they offer one idea at a time—they must present their ideas in the order that makes most sense to a reader. Successfully structuring an essay means attending to a reader’s logic.

 

         The focus of such an essay predicts its structure. It dictates the information readers need to know and the order in which they need to receive it. Thus your essay’s structure is necessarily unique to the main claim you’re making. Although there are guidelines for constructing certain classic essay types (e.g., comparative analysis), there are no set formulas.

 

Answering Questions:  The Parts of an Essay

 

A typical essay contains many different kinds of information, often located in specialized parts or sections. Even short essays perform several different operations: introducing the argument, analyzing data, raising counter-arguments, concluding. Introductions and conclusions have fixed places, but other parts don’t. Counter-argument, for example, may appear within a paragraph, as a free-standing section, as part of the beginning, or before the ending. Background material (historical context or biographical information, a summary of relevant theory or criticism, the definition of a key term) often appears at the beginning of the essay, between the introduction and the first analytical section, but might also appear near the beginning of the specific section to which it’s relevant.   

It’s helpful to think of the different essay sections as answering a series of questions your reader might ask when encountering your thesis. (Readers should have questions. If they don’t, your thesis is most likely simply an observation of fact, not an arguable claim.)

 

“What?”  The first question to anticipate from a reader is “what”: What evidence shows that the phenomenon described by your thesis is true? To answer the question you must examine your evidence, thus demonstrating the truth of your claim. This “what” or “demonstration” section comes early in the essay, often directly after the introduction. Since you’re essentially reporting what you’ve observed, this is the part you might have most to say about when you first start writing. But be forewarned: it shouldn’t take up much more than a third (often much less) of your finished essay.  If it does, the essay will lack balance and may read as mere summary or description.

 

“How?”  A reader will also want to know whether the claims of the thesis are true in all cases. The corresponding question is “how”: How does the thesis stand up to the challenge of a counter-argument? How does the introduction of new material—a new way of looking at the evidence, another set of sources—affect the claims you’re making? Typically, an essay will include at least one “how” section. (Call it “complication” since you’re responding to a reader’s complicating questions.) This section usually comes after the “what,” but keep in mind that an essay may complicate its argument several times depending on its length, and that counter-argument alone may appear just about anywhere in an essay.

 

“Why?”  Your reader will also want to know what’s at stake in your claim: Why does your interpretation of a phenomenon matter to anyone beside you? This question addresses the larger implications of your thesis. It allows your readers to understand your essay within a larger context. In answering “why”, your essay explains its own significance. Alhough you might gesture at this question in your introduction, the fullest answer to it properly belongs at your essay’s end. If you leave it out, your readers will experience your essay as unfinished—or, worse, as pointless or insular.

 

Mapping an Essay

 

Structuring your essay according to a reader’s logic means examining your thesis and anticipating what a reader needs to know, and in what sequence, in order to grasp and be convinced by your argument as it unfolds. The easiest way to do this is to map the essay’s ideas via a writtearrative. Such an account will give you a preliminary record of your ideas, and will allow you to remind yourself at every turn of the reader’s needs in understanding your idea.

 

Essay maps ask you to predict where your reader will expect background information, counter-argument, close analysis of a primary source, or a turn to secondary source material. Essay maps are not concerned with paragraphs so much as with sections of an essay. They anticipate the major argumentative moves you expect your essay to make. Try making your map like this:

 

*   State your thesis in a sentence or two, then write another sentence saying why it’s important to make that claim. Indicate, in other words, what a reader might learn by exploring the claim with you. Here you’re anticipating your answer to the “why” question that you’ll eventually flesh out in your conclusion.

 

*   Begin your next sentence like this: “To be convinced by my claim, the first thing a reader needs to know is . . .” Then say why that’s the first thing a reader needs to know, and name one or two items of evidence you think will make the case. This will start you off on answering the “what” question. (Alternately, you may find that the first thing your reader needs to know is some background information.)

 

*   Begin each of the following sentences like this: “The next thing my reader needs to know is . . .”  Once again, say why, and name some evidence. Continue until you’ve mapped out your essay. 

 

Your map should naturally take you through some preliminary answers to the basic questions of what, how, and why. It is not a contract, though—the order in which the ideas appear is not a rigid one. Essay maps are flexible; they evolve with your ideas.

 

Signs of Trouble

 

A common structural flaw in college essays is the “walk-through” (also labeled “summary” or “description”). Walk-through essays follow the structure of their sources rather than establishing their own. Such essays generally have a descriptive thesis rather than an argumentative one. Be wary of paragraph openers that lead off with “time” words (“first,” “next,” “after,” “then”) or “listing” words (“also,” “another,” “in addition”). Alhough they don’t always signal trouble, these paragraph openers often indicate that an essay’s thesis and structure need work: they suggest that the essay simply reproduces the chronology of the source text (in the case of time words: first this happens, then that, and afterwards another thing . . . ) or simply lists example after example (“In addition, the use of color indicates another way that the painting differentiates between good and evil”).

 

 

Expanded Five Paragraph Essay
or view an outline of the essay

 

 

The Nature of University Essays

The following discussion on the nature of university essays is adapted from Clanchy and Ballard (1981 pp.4-11) who state that at university level it is expected that your essay will be:

1.     clearly focused on the set topic and will deal fully with its central concerns

2.     the result of wide and critical thinking

3.     a reasoned argument

4.     competently presented

(It is also hoped that your essay will be creative and original!)

Understanding the nature of university essays, and what makes a piece of work scholarly, is essential knowledge for students. But you are also required to put your understanding into practice. The above four points can be discussed further in a more practical way.

1.     You will be expected to demonstrate the relevance of your essay to the set topic by:

·         recognising the assumptions and implications underlying the actual working of the topic and taking account of them in the course of your essay;

·         handling the topic and its key terms within the limits of the course and discipline being studied;

·         focusing consistently on the key ideas and terms throughout your essay;

·         covering all the parts of the set topic; some topics will include a number of sub-topics or sub-questions related to the main theme.

2.     You will be expected to demonstrate wide and critical use of written resources by:

·         reading with a questioning mind – not accepting that something is true simply because it is published and not expecting that there is any single correct answer to complex questions;

·         reading in order to understand both the meaning of each individual sentence and its relationship to the developing structure of the argument;

·         evaluating continuously what you are reading by testing the opinions and judgments of the writer against the evidence she/he provides and against the opinions and judgments of other writers (and maybe against your own experience) and then by deciding whether this material is relevant to the purpose of your essay.

3.     You will be expected to demonstrate your ability to present a reasoned argument by:

·         selecting only points which are directly relevant to your topic and your argument, discarding those which may have seemed relevant when your ideas were still developing;

·         structuring the material so that the main ideas are presented logically and coherently, i.e. each idea must fit reasonably with that which precedes it and that which follows, and the ideas taken together must lead consistently to your overall conclusion;

·         ensuring that each section of your argument is internally consistent, with the evidence, examples, and quotations clearly supporting or extending the central idea being developed;

·         taking into account alternative points of view or interpretations of the materials you have used.

4.     You will be expected to demonstrate competent presentation skills by:

·         adopting a tone and style which are appropriate to academic writing in general and to the special demands of the discipline in which you are working;

·         using the necessary specialist terminology accurately;

·         using the correct format for quotations;

·         following the form of referencing and bibliographic citation which is standard for the discipline;

·         presenting graphic and numerical data accurately and economically;

·         editing your essay carefully for error in grammar, spelling and punctuation and for precision in choice of words and expression of ideas.

Using references and avoiding plagiarism

It is usual to read widely when preparing university essays. Be aware that you need to identify the source of every quotation you use and create a list of references at the end of your essay. Failure to do this is regarded as plagiarism.

Murdoch University’s “How to Cite References” provides detailed guidance on referencing conventions.

http://wwwlib.murdoch.edu.au/guides/cite.html

Essay Structure – Functional Stages

Adapted from “Essay Writing Materials” by Language and Learning Services, Monash University in Marshall, L. 1997, “A Learning Companion” p. 228

Directive Words

Look at the following list of key words which appear frequently in essay topics. These are outlined in Marshall and Rowland (1998, p.88) to help you work out your approach to the topic.

 

Useful Books

Further information about and assistance with essay writing can be found in the following publications:

How to cite references, 1996, Murdoch University Library Publications, Murdoch.

“How to cite references” is available from the Library.

Taylor, G. 1989, The Student’s Writing Guide for the Arts and Social Sciences, CUP, Cambridge.

Clanchy, J. and Ballard, B. 1981, Essay Writing for Students, Longman Cheshire, Melbourne.

Marshall, L. 1997, A learning companion: Your Guide to Practising Independent Learning, 2nd edition, Murdoch University, Murdoch.

You can peruse “A Learning Companion” at the Student Learning Resource Centre in the Teaching and Learning Centre, Murdoch University.

Marshall, L. and Rowland, F. 1998, A Guide to Learning Independently, 3rd edition, Longman, Melbourne.

Points to Remember

If you have not already looked at the information on plagiarism, please do so now. It is of utmost importance that you know what constitutes plagiarism and collusion and that you avoid any practice of it.